


Sick Day

by Neyiea



Series: home is where you are [5]
Category: LazyTown
Genre: Fluff, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-25
Updated: 2016-12-25
Packaged: 2018-09-12 04:11:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,311
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9054805
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Neyiea/pseuds/Neyiea
Summary: Stephanie is sick and stuck at home, so she and Robbie build a pillow fort.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into English available: [[Podfic] Sick Day](https://archiveofourown.org/works/9436058) by [swagnushammersmith](https://archiveofourown.org/users/swagnushammersmith/pseuds/swagnushammersmith)



> Merry Christmas! <3  
> Also, I didn't go into detail but if even vague descriptions of someone being ill makes you a bit queasy skip down to "It takes half an hour for her to get settled and back into bed."

She awakens to a roiling feeling in her gut, and barely manages to run to the bathroom before whatever food left in her stomach is forcefully expelled. She’s crying by the time her father rushes in and kneels down beside her, one hand drawing soothing lines up and down her back.

“Dad I don’t feel good,” she manages to say through her tears. She coughs and tries to spit the vile taste out of her mouth without much success. 

“I know sweetie, I’m sorry.” He tucks her hair behind her ears, then presses a kiss to her temple. “Do you feel like you’re going to be sick again?”

“I don’t know.” The worst of it seems over for now, but she doesn’t feel much better than she did right when she woke up. It makes Stephanie want to curl into a ball right here on the bathroom floor. Sportacus presses the back of his hand against her forehead, the tense lines of his face relaxing only slightly when he finds she doesn’t feel feverish.

“Take your time. I’ll stay right here with you, okay?”

Stephanie nods and lets herself limply settle her weight against her father until the majority of the sick feeling passes.

“I think I’m done.”

“Okay,” he runs a hand through her hair, “how about we get your teeth brushed?”

The thought of her overpoweringly mint toothpaste mixing with the taste left in her mouth makes her cringe.

“We’ll just use water,” he clarifies at her expression, and he slowly helps ease her up from the floor and leads her over to the sink.

She brushes and gargles while he looks through their medicine cabinet for some gravol. She takes the tablet from him and without thinking bites down on it. Something about the chalky texture makes nausea overcome her like a tidal wave and within seconds she’s leaning over the toilet again.

It takes half an hour for her to get settled and back into bed. Sportacus crouches down on her floor and makes soothing, wordless noises as he tucks her hair behind her ears and makes sure her blankets are pulled up high enough. 

“Try and get some rest sweetheart. I hope you feel better in the morning, but I’m definitely calling school to let them know you’re not coming in so you can just stay in bed as long as you need to, alright?”

Stephanie nods, trying to let herself relax.

“I’ll stay home today too. If you need anything at all, just let me know.”

She nods mutely, and her father presses one last kiss to her forehead before he leaves.

Stephanie lays on her back, drawing in slow deep breaths in an effort to make her stomach feel settled, and eventually falls asleep.

When she wakes up she still feels slightly nauseous, though it’s nothing compared to hours before, and she blearily turns to the clock on her bedside table to look at the time. It’s only half past seven, around when she’d usually wake up to get ready for school, and with a groan she rolls over and tucks her knees up to her chest, fitfully trying to fall back to sleep. It’s no use. Even though she’s tired she just can’t seem to drift off again, and no matter how much she tosses and turns she just can’t seem to get comfortable. After nearly twenty minutes she gives up, rolling out of bed and draping her duvet over her shoulders as she leaves her bedroom, making her way to the living room and lying down on the couch.

Not even a minute after she’d sprawled herself across the sofa her father perches on the arm by her feet, concern evident on his features.

“Couldn’t sleep anymore?”

She shakes her head.

“Can I get you anything? Even if you don’t feel like you can eat right now you should at least drink something.”

“Can I have some ginger tea?” Maybe that would help rid her of the lingering queasiness.

“Of course. I’ll make some for you right now.” He slips away, his movements more subdued than usual, and if Stephanie strains her ears she can hear him working away in the kitchen, grating fresh ginger to steep in boiling water. When he returns with a mug of lightly steaming tea she forces herself to sit up, gratefully taking it from her father. She cradles the warmth in her hands and basks in the smell, already feeling a little better just from the comforting scent of it.

“I’m going to go pick up that chicken noodle soup you like from the grocery store. Is there anything else you need? Maybe some ginger ale?”

“Just the soup, I think.” She takes her first sip of tea, sighing into the mug. “Thanks dad.”

“It’s no problem Stephanie.” He sits beside her on the couch and wraps an arm around her shoulders, and she tucks herself into his side. She’s half done with her tea when a soft knock rings through the apartment, but before Sportacus even has the chance to rock to his feet they can hear the front door open.

“We’re in the living room Robbie,” Stephanie calls, and a few moments later Robbie is trailing into sight. She pats the space beside her and Robbie quickly takes his place, hands fluttering about nervously as if he’s unsure what to do.

“I brought some things, just crackers and stuff that my mom used to get me whenever I was sick as a kid. I left them in a bag by the door.” He looks over her face intently, brow creasing with worry. “You look tired,” he says bluntly, and it startles a laugh out of her.

“I feel tired, but I couldn’t go back to sleep after I woke up.” She takes another sip of tea.

“But you’re feeling a little better this morning, right?” He hovers, concerned in a way that makes Stephanie wonder, not for the first time, if this is what having a second parent feels like.

“I feel better, yeah, I don’t really feel like eating though.” Just the thought of food makes her stomach churn unpleasantly, and she hastily finishes her drink.

“I’ll see if I can entice your appetite back by making that soup. I’ll go pick it up now.” Sportacus stands up from the couch and offers out a hand to take the empty mug. “I won’t be long.” He casts a fond look over both the seated occupants of the couch before bidding goodbye.

Robbie twiddles his thumbs for a minute or two after Sportacus leaves, and Stephanie patiently waits for him to start speaking.

“So, what do you feel like doing since you can’t fall asleep and you’re stuck inside today? We could put some movies on. Or I’ve got some old board games and card games, if you want.”

“I’m not sure what I want to do.” She slumps into the space that her father vacated. “I hate being sick. I feel like crawling into a pile of blankets and not moving for a week.”

Robbie hums under his breath, and when Stephanie glances over she sees his gaze flit about the room, as if he’s mentally calculating something.

“I have an idea,” he tells her, a hopeful smile tugging at his lips. “I’ll be right back, I just have to grab some things from my apartment!”

She watches him dash away, bewildered. She is no less bewildered when he reappears five minutes later, dragging the two cushions from his own couch behind him. He deposits them on the floor, then brings in more pillows than one person probably needs, and then he drags in the blankets from his own bed.

“What is all of this for,” she asks once he’s done moving around. His hopeful smile comes back at full power.

“We’re going to make the greatest pillow fort ever.”

“Oh?” She leans forward curiously as he begins to push the coffee table in front of the couch out of the way. “How do you know it will be the greatest?”

“Because we’re making it, of course.”

“We’d better get to work then, huh?” She folds back her duvet and stands up, happy for something to physically take part in. “What do you need me to do?”

“Grab a couple of chairs from the kitchen table.”

She complies, dragging two chairs behind her as Robbie folds up her duvet and puts it to the side so that he can take off the couch cushions.

“Put them just in front of the arms of the couch, with the backs of the chairs facing each other, yes, just like that,” he says as he puts several pillows down right in front of the couch, then leans the couch cushions on an angle on top of them. “Then we’ll take my cushions and lean them against the legs of the chairs, just to make sure no one, such as my clumsy self, bumps their head.”

Stephanie giggles a bit as she moves the cushions into position. “I’ll grab more pillows.”

“Excellent idea. You can never have too many pillows in a pillow fort.”

She nods in understanding, then darts to her own room to pluck the two pillows off of her bed and add them to Robbie’s pile. It doesn’t seem to be enough, so she sneaks into her father’s room to grab his pillows as well.

She watches with interest as Robbie lays his own blankets down on the area in front of the couch, and he uses all of the pillows to line the three enclosed sides once more, giving the area an almost nest-like appearance. It looks comfortable, but like it’s missing something, so Stephanie brings out a few of her stuffed animals and lines them up in a row on the bare seat of the couch.

That’s when Sportacus walks in on them, eyebrows raising even as a large smile overtakes his face.

“I see you’ve been busy while I was gone.”

“We’re making a pillow fort,” Stephanie tells him, “and then the three of us are going to play games, Robbie said he had some he could bring up.”

“That sounds like a lot of fun! Do you two need any help?”

Robbie and Stephanie both shake their heads.

“Do you think you feel up to trying to eat some soup now?”

Stephanie pauses, taking a moment to notice the way any lingering feelings of nausea have begun to dissipate. 

“I think I can try.”

“That’s good, I’ll get you when it’s ready. You two keep working.” He heads into the kitchen, and Robbie and Stephanie make finishing touches to their floor space.

“Now we just need a couple of lighter sheets to make ourselves a roof. And maybe something tall and thin to put in this center area where the opening will be, just to make sure they stay propped up. I’ll pin the sheets together so that it’s long enough to fall past either side of the chairs.”

“I think we have some old sheets in our linen closet, I’ll go check.” She scuttles off and comes back with some of their older bed linens, which Robbie takes from her gratefully. He then digs into his pocket and pulls out a small package of safety pins, and Stephanie watches him lay the sheets out before him, overlapping the edges by about an inch, before he starts pinning them together at four inch intervals.

He’s just about done when Sportacus comes to tell her that the soup is ready, and that he was making her some more tea, and Stephanie makes Robbie promise not to finish the fort without her.

She eats most of her soup and some of the crackers that Robbie had brought over while Sportacus goes to check on the progress they’ve made in his absence. She can hear them both laughing lightly from where she’s seated and she leans back in her chair to peek around the doorway, just for a second, in time to see her father crouch down and affectionately press his and Robbie’s foreheads together. 

Together the three of them drape the two connected blankets over the back of the couch and the two chairs, tying the corners around the armrests to keep the top taut.

“I think it looks pretty cozy,” Robbie tells them, “what do you guys think?”

“It’s perfect!” Stephanie crawls in to the middle of the space, dragging her duvet behind her to spread over her legs and lounging comfortably against the pillows that Robbie had braced against the couch. 

“Good to hear. I’ll just pop down to my apartment to grab some cards.”

Stephanie can’t quite see the top half of her father or Robbie from where she’s laying, but she does see Robbie step nearer while her father lifts himself up on his toes. She folds her hands together and grins.

They play several rounds of Uno, Robbie and Sportacus tucked into the fort on opposite sides from each other, and by their fourth game Stephanie feels as if her eyelids are becoming heavier. It’s so comfortable and safe in this little space that they’d made for themselves, with her two favourite adults on either side of her. The small talk going on between Sportacus and Robbie creates a soothing background noise, broken up occasionally by one of her own yawns, and she sets down a pick-up-four card for Robbie before deciding to close her eyes, just for a minute. By the time it’s her turn again she can’t quite seem to muster up the energy to open them.

She hears a soft chuckle, and feels a hand thread gently through her hair. “Night dad,” she mumbles, too drowsy to notice the way the hand abruptly stills, as if startled.

She’s fully asleep not a minute later.

**Author's Note:**

> If you listen closely you can hear the sound of me screaming at that last little line of dialogue.


End file.
